


well, not me, i wanna be the one in the sun

by r1ker



Category: Midnight Special (2016)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-17
Updated: 2016-04-17
Packaged: 2018-06-02 17:13:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6574951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/r1ker/pseuds/r1ker





	well, not me, i wanna be the one in the sun

_Lucas is running._

_He doesn't know why his feet are hitting the soft earth with such voracity. All he knows is he's got to go, and he's got to go now. Distantly he can hear the dull roar of an old truck's engine, far too gone in the years to have been given a salvageable new motor. Above that he hears something no one should ever have to hear should they have the option to._

_Someone is crying._

_In the cloud of dust and gravel that flings up around him as he sprints he can make out a face. Behind the stained back window of the old truck is a young man's face, red as the earth that once gathered in the crevices of their white tennis shoes, knowing better than to let them get dirty. The cheeks are wet, the skin glinting off of the late daylight that casts down from above across the scene. Lucas's lungs are burning. At this rate, he's not going to make it long enough to catch up to the truck and this mysterious man. He doesn't even know why he's making such an impassioned effort until it hits him._

_He is yelling._

_His voice sounds disembodied from his very soul, something louder and more booming than he ever thought possible from himself. He screams and he shouts, reaches pitches he didn't know he was able to make. Somehow his words don't seem to pierce the chassis of the truck, that back window with the same sobbing figure peering out helplessly. Once he reaches the end of the road, an unfathomable depth looking up at him as the truck coasts over an imaginary road into nothingness, he knows who it is. And he knows it all too well to have spent such a long time retrospecting on it._

_The last thing Lucas can remember that voice saying was_ I can't, don't make me!

_Roy is gone._

_Soon he's down on his knees on the ground, jeans getting muddied for an unwelcome puddle has come up to meet him in his grief. Those lungs of his that were working double time to get him absolutely nowhere start to heave again with something other than adrenaline. It is with a grief unlike any he's ever felt before does he collapse knowing that that was Roy that was whisked away from him. His hands ball into loose fists as they drag across his face in a feeble effort to stem the flow of tears. They burn hot down his face each time he blinks slowly. A strange noise leaves his throat. No longer a scream of anger it is a sob of despair._

_It's as if every single figure on earth was taken away at this very moment, leaving him to wallow on the floor of the west Texas atmosphere. It seems to carry on merrily as he deconstructs, wind whipping gently against his worn leather jacket and sneaking beneath it to leave him damp with perspiration after a while. And soon it becomes apparent that this isn't a day trip out to Sugarland to tend to the livestock prospects the Tomlins thought they'd get a cent out of. This isn't a one-nighter to Houston to see the Astros play. Roy won't be coming back the next morning with a tired smile on his face and a bag of dirty clothes slung over his back, at the ready for his mother to launder dutifully. There won't be a catch-up afternoon together to talk about all the guys Roy got to see in their prime as they dismantled some inferior team, no kisses snuck in-between quips about just how boring Roy's always found baseball but soldiers through it for his father. This culminates in the final blow to Lucas and manifests as two invisible hands squeezing with a vice grip on his ribs._

_He is devastated._

_For a while he stays on the ground. No use trying to get up if there's not going to be someone behind you at the ready to dust off your knees, tug your jacket back into place, and kiss you on the temple in such a way to inquire as to why you were even crying in the first place. The day around him turns into a beautiful dusk he can't even consider in such a light for the blinders settling in over his eyes. There is nothing to be seen now, the rich southwestern moon now unable to illuminate Roy's eyes in the way that made Lucas lose his breath. Only when the soft patter of an unexpected fall rain begins to tap on his shoulder does he rise and with a slow gait, begin to limp back to his home far away from the stretch of the road his life ended on._

Lucas wakes up and for a moment he thinks he's been underwater while unconscious. He takes in a deep breath and in the process shrugs off Roy's arms around his shoulder as the two sleep together. The inhale ends on the cusp of a sob as his eyes unexpectedly burn with tears, and he bites it back to avoid waking up Roy. That doesn't seem to last too long because Roy, in all his intuition as to who Lucas is, stirs slowly and works to envelop as much of Lucas as he can without the two toppling over. 

"You're okay," Roy says quietly like he's bringing down a wounded animal from the high of being chased by death. "You're okay, it's okay." The mantra does little to placate Lucas, who has to physically turn around and wrap himself around Roy to stop from believing that nightmare any more. Roy accepts without question, nose resting against Lucas's temple and breathing out slow to let Lucas know he's  _here_. He closes his eyes as the two remain close together for several more minutes. After a while Lucas's heart stops tapping a nervous tattoo against his ribcage. He is the one that makes the move to rearrange the two of them lying down on the bed. 

"Sorry," he murmurs into Roy's collarbone, who makes a noise of quiet dismissal in response. Roy's hand strokes gently against the back of his head, fingers stopping from time to time to curl against the shell of Lucas's ear. Lucas starts to bring himself out of it as well, takes in deep inhales of Roy's scent as exhaustion comes back over him once more. "Was a lot worse before you came back."

"I bet," Roy says considerably. "I'm not going anywhere. And if I do, you're going with me, Alton's going with me. No more being by my lonesome, yeah?" Lucas nods with his head just beneath Roy's chin. 

"Yeah," Lucas says quietly as with one last kiss Roy sends him back to sleep with the promises of no more sudden departures on anyone's part without their say-so. 


End file.
